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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28369905">A detective's job</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngelaIsAWeeb/pseuds/AngelaIsAWeeb'>AngelaIsAWeeb</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>HoloEN, Hololive, Virtual Streamer Animated Characters, holoMyth</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Blood and Gore, Blood and Injury, F/F, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Infiltration, Investigations, Murder Mystery, Mystery, Other, Slow Burn, Strangers to Lovers, Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 23:26:23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>17,954</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28369905</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngelaIsAWeeb/pseuds/AngelaIsAWeeb</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Without any new interesting cases to work on, Amelia Watson decided to take on a simple one: find out who ransacked a butcher's shop.<br/>She ends up finding something unexpected...or rather someone.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Gawr Gura/Watson Amelia (hololive), Mori Calliope/Takanashi Kiara</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>55</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>461</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. A day with 2 surprises</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hope you enjoy!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>If someone were to mention Amelia’s best quality on the job it would be the fact that she never gets surprised by anything.<br/>A time traveler working as a detective has seen a lot of things, especially a lot of peculiar things.</p>
<p>When she got a call saying that someone ransacked a  butcher’s shop at first she didn’t even want to investigate, but having an empty schedule and a lot of boredom to deal with, she decided that even a lame job was better than nothing.</p>
<p>She headed to the place and she immediately saw pieces of meat and residues of blood scattered on the brick floor of the shop, the owner was standing next to the entrance door and immediately greeted her.</p>
<p>“Ah, Detective Watson! Thanks for coming, I’m sure you must’ve been busy with more important cases…” he said with a concerned face.<br/>“It’s alright, I want to help as much as possible…so, I can already see a big mess.”<br/>“Indeed, yesterday I closed off for the night like usual, locked the door and windows and headed back home…when I got back this morning I found this…” he replied with a worried expression.<br/>“Was any money taken from the register?” asked the detective, taking out her small notebook and pen.<br/>“I immediately checked, but all the money is still there...only the meat was taken” answered the man, scratching the back of his neck.</p>
<p>‘No money taken? No robber would leave without something of value…so why take only the meat?’ she wondered while scribbling down the information.</p>
<p>“I see, I’ll have a look around for more clues” she added walking around the shop, her trusty magnifying glass ready for use. <br/>She headed towards one of the pieces of meat and grabbed it with a gloved hand.<br/>An expression of curiosity was hinted by a raised eyebrow after looking at the clue: it was a piece of cow’s leg (or what was left of it), mostly eaten.<br/>As the detective gave a closer inspection she noticed bite marks.</p>
<p>‘Who in their right mind would eat raw meat?’ she wondered.<br/>‘Wait, these teeth marks aren’t normal…’ multiple lines of teeth mark were located on the left side of the meat, Amelia immediately thought that no human could have done this.</p>
<p>“I will need to look at this in my office, this seems more complicated than I first thought, but I’m almost 100% sure this was the work of an animal and not a human” she stated, drawing the marks down on her notes.<br/>“A-an animal? But how did it get inside-“<br/>“That is something I still don’t have an answer for, but I will continue investigating this…could I have a map of the shop’s structure? It could help in solving this mystery” she asked with a calm voice.<br/>The owner didn’t argue and after finding what she needed, Watson left and headed back to her office.</p>
<p>----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>‘Damn, I can’t figure this out…’ she thought looking through the clues she found.<br/>She had been working through the whole day, searching for specific bite marks in some old animal books she had collected over the years, looking at all the details of the shop’s map; at 10 pm she grew tired from the research.</p>
<p>The only thing Amelia seemed to have found was the way the animal entered: the butcher’s shop was located above the sewers and there was an access through an old manhole in the kitchen.<br/>Questions kept on coming to her: what kind of animal would have the capacity of opening a manhole? Where did it go after it ransacked the meat? Would it be back? So many questions but no answers.</p>
<p>“I should get some sleep, otherwise I will only get a headache…and that surely won’t help me” she mumbled to herself, heading to her bedroom located next to her office; as soon as she washed herself and changed, she got in the bed and soon fell asleep.</p>
<p>It was just past midnight when the detective heard a sound.<br/>She wasn’t a heavy sleeper and she immediately woke up, her vision still a bit foggy and still tired.</p>
<p>As he went to sit up straight, she noticed a shadowy figure standing in front of her bed, face covered by what appeared to be a hoodie.<br/>“Who are you?” she asked in a low whisper, being as cautious as possible.<br/>The figure didn’t speak but slowly walked closer to her, the detective gulped: her time-traveling pocket watch was on her nightstand but she would obviously be seen if she tried to reach for it; her anxiety grew as the person moved next to her bedside.</p>
<p>But it slowly dissipated as the figure tripped on herself and let out a “A!” of surprise, landing face first on the floor.<br/>Watson was wide-eyed at what just had happened but immediately got up, grabbed her pocket watch in case things got worse and, after turning on the lamp on her nightstand, she watched the intruder.</p>
<p>And for the first time in her life…she was surprised.<br/>A young looking girl with a blue hoodie was currently sitting on her floor, holding her face in pain and muttering some curse words…but what surprised her wasn’t the fact that there was an intruder in her home…but the tail that poked out from her lower back.</p>
<p>“I will ask you again…Who. Are. You” she asked directly looking at her.<br/>A few tears started to swell on the side of the shorter girl’s eyes, but as she was questioned again she looked up.<br/>“Uh…My name is Gawr Gura”<br/>“Is that real?” The detective asked, pointing to the tail.<br/>“Y-yeah?”</p>
<p>Amelia was out of words.<br/>“Umh…I can explain why I’m here” the shorter girl mumbled.<br/>“Then start talking” Amelia said with a bit of impatience.<br/>“Ok so uh…this will sound weird but I am a shark from Atlantis” started the shark, looking at the taller girl’s expression.<br/>‘A shark? From Atlantis?’ Watson found this hard to believe, but she decided to give the girl the benefit of the doubt.<br/>“I left my home because I wanted a new life on land, but it’s hard to hide my appearance…and I also don’t have any money…” she continued, now sitting cross-legged; Amelia listened with curiosity but still cautious.</p>
<p>“I was hiding in the sewers for a few days, but I started getting hungry…and then I heard the smell of meat so-“<br/>“Wait, so you were the one who entered the butcher’s shop and ate the meat?” Interrupted Amelia.<br/>“…Yeah, it’s pretty embarrassing….” Replied Gura, her cheeks tainted red.<br/>“But why are you in my house? “ Questioned the detective, ‘Did she plan on killing me to avoid being found out?’ she wondered.<br/>“Oh, after I ate I went back into the sewers but then I heard speaking the next morning; I thought that I’d been found out and I started panicking…after you left the store I got out of the sewers without being seen by the owner and started following you” she continued explaining.</p>
<p>‘How did I not notice her?’ Wondered Amelia: she had always been careful of her surrounding since the kidnapping accident many years ago.  <br/>“I waited until it got dark and then I kinda…broke your door handle…and got in…sorry” finished the shark with a guilty look on her face.<br/>“But…why?” Wondered Watson, she thought the girl would make the situation clearer but she seemed to get more confused as time passed.<br/>“Well, I got scared…I came here to explain what happened”<br/>“But why at night?”<br/>“Well it’s hard walking on the streets without being noticed, doing it during the night saved me a lot of trouble”.</p>
<p>Amelia wanted to face palm.<br/>“So let me get this straight, you ate food from a butcher’s shop, got scared of being found out and broke in the home of the person’s investigating to explain your side of the story” recollected Watson.<br/>“Yeah that’s about it…” mumbled out the shark girl.<br/>“I should call the police and get you arrested” told the detective crossing her arms on her chest, giving a disapproving look to the shorter girl.</p>
<p>Gura looked down on her lap, a sad expression on her face; she was definitely feeling regret for what she did…Amelia couldn’t look at her for long, a pain in her chest made her eyes wander anywhere else but the girl in front of her.</p>
<p>She let out a tired sigh, scratching the back of her head.<br/>“I should…but from what I see, you aren’t completely human…you’re more like a mythical creature” ‘Hard to believe and definitely surprising, but I am a time traveler after all’ thought the blonde.<br/>“And if you really told the truth, what you did was out of survival, not out of malice…so I won’t do it” she finally concluded.</p>
<p>Gura’s expression immediately changed after hearing those words and a bright smile graced her lips;<br/>“REALLY!? THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!” Yelled the shark, hugging the taller girl.<br/>Amelia was again surprised, the second time in her whole life; a small blush was appearing on her but she tried to hide it with a small cough that caught the attention of the shark girl.</p>
<p>“Oh sorry! I was just happy”<br/>“I saw, but it’s alright…so, what will you do now?” asked the blonde, which made Gura realize she didn’t have any idea on what to do.<br/>The detective was very good at reading faces (especially after many years investigating) “So you don’t have any clue…” she muttered.</p>
<p>The shark could only nod at that truth.<br/>The detective wondered for what seemed an eternity (in reality it was only a few seconds) and the idea that passed through her head made her wonder ‘Will I regret this?’.</p>
<p>She sighed again and then started speaking again “You could…stay with me for a while…since you don’t have any place to stay at”.<br/>Gura looked both baffled and relieved.<br/>“FOR REAL!?” <br/>“Yeah, for real…but you will help me around the office, alright? I don’t like freeloaders” added the blonde.<br/>“Yes Ma’am!” replied the blue-haired girl, saluting like a soldier.<br/>“Umh…where should I sleep?” she continued.<br/>“Either you sleep on the couch or on the bed with me” answered the detective, getting back under her bed covers.</p>
<p>Gura looked a bit embarrassed, scratch that, she was completely embarrassed.<br/>“Would…would you mind if I-“<br/>“Slept on the same bed as me? No, but if you steal the blanket I will kick you out” <br/>The shark was still embarrassed, but decided to climb into the bed next to the other girl.</p>
<p>“Well uh…goodnight…detective?”<br/>“My name’s Amelia Watson”<br/>“I see…goodnight Watson”<br/>“Goodnight Gura”</p>
<p>‘Maybe I should take lame cases more often’ was the last thought she had before falling asleep.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. A detective and her assistant</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>After Amelia took the decision to help the girl who intruded in her home, she gets a call about a corpse found in a farm.<br/>Both of the girls head over to investigate.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hope you enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Amelia was the first one to wake up, and immediately she remembered everything that happened the day before.</p><p>The girl who entered her home at an ungodly hour was still sleeping, curled up like a cat and snoring quietly.<br/>
A smile almost slipped past, but she restrained herself and decided it was time to have breakfast.</p><p>‘I should wake her up, so we can discuss while we eat’ pondered Watson, quietly leaning towards the shark; she gently touched her shoulder and started shaking her a little to take her away from dream land.<br/>
Gura slowly woke up but she was still rather groggy, a small “mornin” was the only sound that came out from her.</p><p>Watson informed that she would be preparing breakfast: the blue-haired girl’s tiredness immediately disappeared, the detective headed into the kitchen located on the left side of her office and the shorter girl followed like a lost puppy.</p><p>Soon the food was ready and the two girls started eating, both seemed like they hadn’t eaten in days.<br/>
Amelia was the first one that started speaking “Alright, if we are going to live together we are going to need some house rules.”<br/>
“Like what?” Asked the shark.<br/>
“Like house chores, no walking around naked…” at that Gura’s face shined a bright red “I would never do that!” she replied feeling mocked.<br/>
“We met just yesterday, so I want to be sure.” commented Watson, and the shorter girl realized she couldn’t argue with that statement.<br/>
“Also no leaving without me-“<br/>
“EH?? WHY!?” promptly wondered Gura.<br/>
“You said it yourself: you can’t walk around in public, but I’m a respected detective in this town, so if you are seen around me you won’t get involved in trouble.” Explained the blonde.</p><p>“But…my tail is still visible.”<br/>
“Have you tried wrapping it around your waist? I’m sure your hoodie is large enough to hide it.” Proposed Amelia, looking at the girl’s appendage that pocked out of the bottom of her hoodie.</p><p>“Oh…” As soon as the phrase was spoken, the shark tried doing what the blonde suggested.</p><p>And, indeed, the idea worked.</p><p>“WOAH! This actually hides my tail!” commented Gura, taking in her new appearance.<br/>
“Good, now we have one less problem to worry about.”<br/>
“But what about my teeth? If I speak-“<br/>
“I own a facemask, you’ll wear it in public.” again, Amelia came out with another solution.</p><p>The shark was surprised by the problem solving skills of her new roommate, who was helping her even though her circumstances were horrible…I mean, who would let someone like her live in a house together after breaking in the night before?</p><p>“Anyway, I know these last rule seems quite harsh but it’s for your own safety.” Said the detective, running  a hand through her messy hair.<br/>
“I get it…hey Watson, I really app-“ the blue-haired girl was interrupted by a phone ringing.</p><p>Amelia promptly got up from the breakfast table and answered the call.<br/>
She didn’t speak much, only a few ‘Yes’ and ‘I understand’…but then she heard her say “Me and my partner will be there as soon as possible ma’am.”</p><p>Gura looked intently at her the whole time, particularly her expression: both troubled but professional.<br/>
The moment the detective put down the old phone, she started walking towards her coat on the hanger next to the entrance door (Amelia noticed that the lock was completely wrecked).<br/>
“We need to go, a body has been discovered early this morning” was the only thing the blonde said before putting on her hat and coat, throwing the facemask to Gura and heading out towards the exit.</p><p>“H-HEY! Wait for me!!” </p><p>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p><p>The place they reached was a simple farm, located near the outskirts of the city.<br/>
Cows were mooing from the fields and some guard dogs were watching over some sheeps that were eating in their enclosure.</p><p>Heading towards the door of the barn, she saw a middle-aged woman, clearly shaken, beside 2 police officers; both of the officers standing up while the woman was leaning on the wooden door of the barn.</p><p>Amelia removed her hat to greet the people, muttering a soft ‘good morning’ but still holding a serious tone.</p><p>“Good day to you as well detective.” answered the tallest of the two officers.<br/>
“We were asking some questions to the lady here before calling you, maybe you could help us out.” said the other one.</p><p>Watson only nodded and put her hat back on, while Gura awkwardly greeted the others.<br/>
“You got yourself an assistant? I thought you preferred to work alone.” commented again the first officer.<br/>
Amelia chuckled a little “The girl wanted to learn how to become a detective, so I decided I’d be kind enough to let her follow me while I do my job.” She replied, lying as easily as she breathed.<br/>
The officers didn’t question her statement and started explaining what the lady told them at once.</p><p>The woman headed towards the barn early in the morning to grab food for the animals, but as she entered she found the body of a man in his thirties with his head cut off.<br/>
The identity of the man turned out to be that of a common criminal who had been arrested in the past for gun trafficking and several other crimes…one time it had been Amelia who had put him to jail.</p><p>Both the detective and the shark headed inside to look at the state of the body.<br/>
Amelia had seen various corpses in her career and she wasn’t shocked by what she saw lying on the barn’s dirty floor, but she noticed that the girl beside her didn’t give any sign of disturbance from seeing such a grotesque scene.</p><p>Watson immediately started analyzing the traces and marks left on it, keeping her attention onto every detail she noticed.</p><p>Gura was quietly watching, not the body itself but the detective’s work: she was amazed by how professional and critical she was…and how cool she looked.</p><p>But while being ‘distracted’ by the detective in front of her, the shark noticed something…or rather smelled something.</p><p>“Hey Ame, I smell something weird coming from that body…” she muttered quietly, leaning closer to the blonde’s ear.<br/>
“What are you, a dog? Also you already started calling me with a nickname of some sort? You like me that much already?” teased the detective, causing a small blush on the blue-haired girl’s cheeks.<br/>
“A-Ame is shorter to say ok? Anyway I’m not kidding…there’s a smell of…burned meat” added the shark, pointing to the direction of where the smell was coming from: the man’s fingertips.</p><p>Watson grabbed the man’s hands and noticed that his finger pads on both hands were crispy black.<br/>
“You were right, his fingertips have basically turned into coal”  she muttered, scribbling down the information in her trusty notebook.</p><p>Gura felt a little proud for discovering this clue.</p><p>“Well, from what I gathered, the cause of death is clearly decapitation: a big cutting blade must be the weapon he was attacked with….but the traces on his hands make me wonder if he was attacked by multiple people or if he was tortured before he was murdered.” Explained Watson.</p><p>Gura listened with the upmost attention to everything the other girl said.<br/>
Amelia pondered for a second and looked at the surroundings for more clues, she noticed some barely visible footprints.</p><p>“Looks like man shoes…”she spoke to her partner.<br/>
The shorter girl kneeled to look down at the traces left on the ground by the presumed killer.</p><p>“And not only that…but the traces seem to head out of the barn, come on Gura, we need to follow them” told Amelia, starting to head to where the marks continued.<br/>
Gura followed her again.</p><p>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p><p>The traces brought them to an abandoned storage shed  for various tools used  during field works:<br/>
Inside there were mostly rusty pieces of metal, some saddles and plants who started to grow through the wood planks.<br/>
The detective started looking around, hoping to find something useful.</p><p>Gura followed her example and looked at her surroundings, her eyes not as trained as the detective beside her.<br/>
Nothing peculiar seemed to catch both of their interest…until Watson looked outside the dirty window of the shed and into the tall grass that sprouted all around it.</p><p>A bush was hidden by all the tall grass, and there…a piece of cloth stained in blood was stuck.</p><p>“Well seems like we found something.” Muttered the detective, catching the attention of the blue-haired girl.<br/>
“You want to grab it, my dear ‘assistant’?” she added in a teasing tone, letting out a small chuckle.<br/>
Gura scoffed a little, but went outside to grab the piece of cloth.</p><p>“So, what can you tell about it?” Interrogated the detective, trying to test the girl.<br/>
“Well…it looks like a piece of shirt...probably  the bottom side.” answered the shark, staring at the clue with particular care and attention.</p><p>Amelia raised an eyebrow, impressed by the deduction skills of the girl.<br/>
“Impressive, good job” She complimented her partner.<br/>
Gura didn’t reply but she felt quite satisfied by the praise.</p><p>“Alright, for now let’s head back to the office…we’ll take this with us and we’ll proceed the investigation in the afternoon.” spoke Watson, looking at the pocket watch and noticing that it was already lunch time.<br/>
The shorter girl watched the clock with a peculiar interest, intrigued by the complex design and general beauty of the object…but she noticed that the clock not only counted the hours, but the months and years as well.<br/>
Amelia noticed the stare coming from the other girl and immediately put away the object in her pocket.</p><p>‘I don’t want her to find out I’m a time traveler yet…maybe at all’ she thought while looking away from her partner.<br/>
Gura caught sight of the change in attitude in Watson, but decided to not say anything.</p><p>“Let’s go back home Gura.” she said walking towards the direction they came from.<br/>
“Alright.” was the only reply she got.</p><p>------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p><p>Back home, the first thing Amelia did was call someone on her old phone.<br/>
Gura realized she was talking to the butcher’s shop owner, saying that what attacked his store was a wild animal that entered through the sewers and advised him to lock the passage.</p><p>When she got off the phone, she headed towards the kitchen and started preparing something to eat for the both of them.<br/>
Gura headed in the same direction, standing right behind Amelia.<br/>
“Hey…I wanted to thank you…for all you did for me; I know you’re running a high risk by lying to the owner about what really happened, and also letting me stay with you…I really appreciate it.” She muttered under her breath, a hint of shyness filled with gratitude towards the taller girl.</p><p>Watson stopped cutting some vegetables, a sensation of what she assumed was calmness (or maybe relief for the choice she picked the day before) started filling her heart, which caused  her heartbeat to increase.</p><p>‘Hey, you better calm down there!’ she internally yelled at her own organ.</p><p>“So uh…yeah…thanks Ame.” added the shark girl.<br/>
The way she was saying her name didn’t help slowing down the speed in which her heart was beating, on the contrary it only made it worse.</p><p>“Technically I didn’t lie, you are a shark so you can count as an animal.” She tried playing it cool.<br/>
“But you don’t need to thank me, I’m…glad I helped you.” ‘I’m glad you are  together with me, even if we’ve only known each other for only one day’ was what she was thinking, but that would be something she would never confess.</p><p>As much as she hated to admit, Amelia had a rather lonely life.<br/>
With being a time traveler it was hard keeping any kind of relationship, especially friendships.<br/>
But having someone next to her made her feel…happy.</p><p>Gura smiled a little at the detective’s confession.<br/>
“Anyway, I’m almost done preparing lunch...can you set the table?”</p><p>And the shark with a cheery ‘Yes!’ started helping her new friend.<br/>
As they quietly ate together, having small conversations about what had happened recently and Gura sharing some childhood stories from when she was still a young shark…something was starting to grow in both of their hearts, and maybe one day it would take roots.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. The investigation continues</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>After finding a clue that could help in solving this murder case, the girls find the origin of the cloth...A rather expensive store called "The Golden Diamond".<br/>They decided that a first step into solving this case would be visiting the place...</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hope you enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>In the afternoon, Amelia decided to check with a microscope the piece of shirt they had found; Gura was always beside the girl helping her by handing some books she requested or proposing theories on the case.</p><p>From what they gathered, the cloth was made out of wool, and judging by the quality of it…very expensive.<br/>There weren’t a lot of people who walked around wearing extravagant clothes, not only because of the rather strict number of rich people that lived in the city, but also the lack of luxury clothes shops.</p><p>Only one currently existed, a place called “The Golden Diamond”.</p><p>They decided that going to the store and asking around for information might be a first step, other than that…they didn’t have any other option available at that moment.</p><p>Amelia didn’t have a car so the walk to the shop was rather long but pleasant, when they arrived at the location they promptly entered the shop and walked to the register, were a young girl stood. <br/>"Good afternoon, how may I help you today?" She asked with a bright smile. <br/>"I'm detective Watson Amelia, this is my assistant Gura, we are investigating a murder..."<br/>The lady's eyes showed shock and surprise by the revelation. <br/>"We found a piece of cloth made out of no cheap wool, so we wanted to see all of the clothes you had to compare with the clue we found." Stated Watson, her tone composed and professional. <br/>Gura gently touched the blonde's arm. <br/>"If we find a shirt that matches what we found, we could ask to see the clients register to see who might've bought one of these shirts recently" the shark whispered. <br/>Amelia, once again amazed by the shorter girl, smiled and answered "Brilliant thinking, partner!" </p><p>She was honestly impressed, wondering if the girl was just smart (which seemed hard to believe at first) or if she was learning from watching her, Gura blushed a little and scratched the back of her head.<br/>The lady asked for them to follow and took them towards a section of the store filled with clothes made from animal fur of all kind.</p><p>Gura and Watson began looking around, the piece of cloth partly covered in blood at hand to confront with the other shirts.<br/>The blonde found a long sleeved shirt that was made out of the same material as the cloth and noticed the bottom part of the shirt looked identical to the piece they found, minus the blood.</p><p>“Ma’am, for how long as this shirt been on sale?” Asked the detective.<br/>“Around 4 months…” she answered quietly.<br/>“Alright, we need to know who in the last 4 months has bought this product, could you please let us look through the register?”  she questioned again.<br/>“Of course, let me go grab it.” And off she went to grab the book.</p><p>A moment of silence followed as the detective and her partner stood, waiting for the lady to get back.<br/>The shark was the first one to speak “What do we do if no one has bought this shirt?”.<br/>“Guess we’ll have to go back to the barn and look around more or we tell the police to take care of the case…but I would like to avoid the second option” commented the blonde.</p><p>As she finished speaking, the miss came back with an elegant book “Here’s the register with all of the people who bought in our store: next to their names there’s the type of clothes they bought, the price, date of purchase, home address…the shirt you saw is listed as ‘Long-sleeved gray shirt, unisex - winter collection.” Explained the woman, handing the book to the detective.</p><p>“Thank you miss, we’ll have a look”  as she said that, they opened the book and started their search.<br/>After 5 minutes of looking through countless names, they found only 2 people who bought that specific kind of shirt: Takanashi Kiara and Ninomae Ina’nis.</p><p>The detective handed the book back to the lady and thanked her.</p><p>Now it was time for them to have a chat with these people.</p><p>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p><p>They decided to head to Takanashi Kiara’s house first, as it was closer to the “Golden Diamond”.<br/>The air was chilly, but walking made the two girl feel rather warm; upon reaching the home address they immediately observed how luxurious the house was. </p><p>After knocking on the door, they heard a loud, feminine and high-pitched voice “One second please!”.</p><p>“Would you like to be the one asking the questions?” whispered the blonde, slightly leaning down to reach the shark-girl’s ear.<br/>“Eh?? Me? But I don’t know what to ask!” replied Gura, the sole thought of having to ask questions to a stranger made her nervous beyond recognition.<br/>“I trust your judgement…but if you really want I can do it, no pressure.” Watson’s voice sounded sincere.<br/>“…Alright, I guess I can try” replied the blue-haired girl, directly avoiding the glance of the blonde.</p><p>Someone finally opened the door: an orange-haired girl, with bright eyes and a big smile appeared in front of them and greeted them.<br/>“Good afternoon, oh…may I ask who you are?” she politely asked, staring at both of the strangers who suddenly appeared at her front steps.</p><p>“Sorry for bothering miss, are you Takanashi Kiara? I am the detective Watson Amelia and this is my partner Gura, we are investigating a case and we would like to ask you a few questions.” The blonde spoke.<br/>The girl stared with wide eyes at the detective worried as to why she was in this situation, but she quietly muttered “Y-yes that’s me, you may come in…”.</p><p>She let the two girls enter her home and after closing the door behind her, she took them to the living room where the girls sat down on one of the couches.<br/>“Would you like some tea?” she offered.<br/>“Ah, thank you, that would be appreciated” Answered Amelia, Gura gently shaking her head no.</p><p>After a few minutes, Kiara came back with a tray of the for herself and the blonde and after handing the cup to Amelia she sat in front of them on the opposite sofa.</p><p>“Did something happen…?” the voice of the bubbly girl was now toned down, more serious and cautious.<br/>“Unfortunately we are investigating the murder of a man and we need to ask you some questions…” Answered Watson, throwing a glance at Gura the moment the word ‘Question’ was mentioned, at which the shark started paling.</p><p>Kiara nodded silently.</p><p>“U-umh…” Gura wanted to desperately slap herself, feeling embarrassed: she was going to make herself look like an idiot in front of Watson.<br/>Suddenly, she felt a hand touch her back gently, almost…reassuring.<br/>She followed the sight from where the hand was coming from, and she was met with Amelia’s calm expression, her lips mouthing ‘Relax’.</p><p>The shark breathed in, then out…the hand never leaving her back.</p><p>“Miss Takanashi, you visited a store called ‘The Golden Diamond’ in the last 4 months- is that correct?” The blue-haired girl finally spoke, a sudden confidence raising from her.<br/>“I did, around 2 months ago…” Kiara answered, taking a sip of her tea.<br/>“You bought a long-sleeved gray shirt, is this correct as well?”<br/>“Yes”<br/>“Could we see the shirt you bought?” Amelia didn’t show surprise, but she was left astonished again by that girl: asking to see the shirt to verify it’s integrity…a smart move.</p><p>A tender smile appeared on her face.</p><p>“I-I would but I think my-“ Kiara’s phrase was interrupted as someone entered the house…a tall girl with pink hair, painted nails, a big coat on and holding what appeared to be groceries.<br/>“I’m back! I found that wine we both really like on sale so I bought a few bottl-“ as the pink-haired raised her eyes from the bag to Kiara looking tense and preoccupied, with two strangers sitting right in front of her.</p><p>“…What is going on here?”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Surprise Takamori!!! and also Ina will be in the upcoming chapter....</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. New discoveries and new feelings</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The air is filled with tension as the two detective and her partner see another woman enter kiara's house.<br/>But the investigation needs to continue.</p>
<p>And as time passes, someone begins to realize something.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hope you enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“…What is going on?”.</p>
<p>The tension could’ve been cut with a rusty knife, the detective and her partner looking at the person who just walked through the door; Kiara too was staring at her, she tried giving a smile to try and reassure her, but her eyes told a different story…the glance she threw implied that something must have happened.</p>
<p>Amelia got up from the couch and walked towards the taller girl, extending her hand for a handshake.<br/>“Good day Miss, my name is Amelia Watson…may I ask for your name?” <br/>“Calliope Mori, I asked a question first…What.Is.Going.On.” as much as she tried to control herself, Calli’s worry directed to the other girl was stronger than her self-control, so much that she slapped away the hand of the blonde but at least she contained herself for the most part…if that could be considered ‘containing’.</p>
<p>Amelia didn’t act shocked after the slap, it was quite common for people to act rudely or aggressively in high-tension situations.<br/>Kiara immediately rose from the sofa and walked closer to the pink-haired girl.</p>
<p>“Calli, I-it’s ok really…” Kiara spoke with a gentle but shaky voice, getting even more worried with each passing second.<br/>“Miss Mori, we are investigating a murder case and found some clues that brought us to the name Takanashi Ki-“<br/>“ARE YOU ACCUSING HER OF KILLING SOMEONE?” Any kind of control she had was thrown out of the window at the detective’s statement, now standing directly in front of the blonde and with her face closer to her.</p>
<p>“I’m not accusing her, we are just investigating.”  Amelia replied keeping her cool, Gura on the other hand stood up behind the detective, worried at the current circumstances.</p>
<p>Kiara put a hand on Calli’s shoulder, making the taller girl slightly calmer...the tension was still present, but it was definitely better than nothing.<br/>“May I ask what is your relationship with Miss Takanashi?” Asked Watson, she didn’t show neither worry nor fear, even if the girl she was asking the question to was way taller than her and looked visibly stronger.</p>
<p>“She’s doesn’t go by Takanashi anymore, she’s Mori Kiara now.” She stated with a hint of proudness in her tone.<br/>At hearing the revelation Gura blushed a little.</p>
<p>Before leaving Atlantis she had learned many things about the land-people: one of these things was the fact that when someone changed their surname to their partner’s, it indicated that they shared a deep relationship with eachother…what was the name again for this kind of union?</p>
<p>“Ah I see, my bad…I didn’t know she was married.” Apologized Watson.</p>
<p>Marriage! That was the word…now that she noticed, she could see a glint coming from the orange-haired hand…a golden ring.</p>
<p>“Register?” <br/>“We found a clue that brought us to the store called ‘The Golden Diamond’ and we asked for the register book containing the information of the costumers, your wife already told us she visited the store around 2 months ago and that she bought a long-sleeved gray shirt…we were asking to see the item she purchased.” Explained the detective, as calm as ever.</p>
<p>“I was about to tell them that you are currently wearing it” added Kiara, looking directly into her lover’s eyes.</p>
<p>“Could we please see the shirt?” spoke Gura, she had been quiet from the moment Calli entered the house.<br/>The taller girl didn’t reply, but stepped a little far away from the detective and removed her coat…revealing the gray shirt underneath.<br/>“Do I need to get it off?” She asked looking grumpy.<br/>“No need, Gura…would you please check?” Asked Watson.</p>
<p>The blue-haired girl simply nodded and walked closer to the girl.<br/>She looked at the state of the shirt: other than being slightly worned out, it was still intact in every place…not even a string was out of place.</p>
<p>She turned around to look at the detective and simply said “this is not it”.</p>
<p>Amelia nodded and sighed…guess they had to visit Ninomae Ina’nis.<br/>“Alright, thank you for the cooperation…and sorry for the intrusion, we’ll now take our leave.” She told the couple, gesturing to Gura to follow her.<br/>“Sorry for the intrusion” repeated the shark-girl, walking behind the detective who was headed outside the door.</p>
<p>“I hope you will find the culprit” commented Kiara as they exited the house.<br/>Amelia nodded, and soon the two were out of the home, as they arrived at the side of the road Amelia let out a sigh, scratching the back of her head.</p>
<p>Gura looked at her partner “Are you okay Ame?”<br/>“Yeah, all good.”</p>
<p>Gura wasn’t really convinced.</p>
<p>“You sure?” she asked again.</p>
<p>“Yeah, don’t worry about me…what about you? It wasn’t to stressing for you right?” Amelia wasn’t used to having someone close around her, the sudden worry for her partner made her mentally slap herself;  ‘when was the last time I ever worried about someone else?’ she thought, and the answer to that question didn’t seem to come: sure, she did care for other people, but it was all surface level…she enjoyed her detective job, but as much as she helped people with her job she never felt like their troubles were something that affected her on a deeper level.</p>
<p>Then why did she care about how Gura felt?</p>
<p>“I got worried that something might’ve gone bad…but I was astonished by how you kept your cool!” answered the shark, with a happy smile.</p>
<p>Watson let out a low chuckle, the compliment made her feel pleased with herself.</p>
<p>“Does it happen often? You know…people acting up during an investigation and such…” wondered the shorter girl.<br/>“Mh…I wouldn’t say often, but I would need a lot of hands to count how many times it occurred…once I got punched right in the face.” She replied, recalling the memory with a certain nostalgia.</p>
<p>Gura however had a terrified face plastered onto her.</p>
<p>“H-hey, It’s ok! It was many years ago and honestly it didn’t hurt at all” Past Amelia would have said the contrary, she spent a few days laying on her left side to avoid putting any kind of pressure on her right cheek.<br/>But Gura felt slightly relieved at that, so Amelia didn’t feel too guilty about lying to her.</p>
<p>“Let’s keep going, we have one last place to visit and we want to get there before it gets too dark.” Indeed the sky had tinged itself in orange hues.<br/>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>The two of them headed to Ninomae’s house, luckily for them it wasn’t too far from Kiara’s house; but upon arriving they thought they might have had the wrong address: the house didn’t look too fancy and it was rather small…it definitely didn’t appear to be the house of someone who could afford expensive clothes, but nevertheless they knocked on the door.</p>
<p>As the door opened, a young girl with long dark air, a mole under her eye, slim and with clothes covered in paint (some paint was even on the side of her face) appeared.</p>
<p>“Yes?” she muttered in a quiet voice, holding a paintbrush in her hand.</p>
<p>“Good afternoon Miss, are you Ninomae Ina’nis?” Asked Amelia.<br/>“Yes?”<br/>“I’m detective Amelia Watson and this is my partner Gura, we need to ask you a few questions related to a case” <br/>“Ah…Ok, come in” Ina moved away from the door, letting the two girls walk through.</p>
<p>The inside of the house was messy: there were art’s tools everywhere, from canvases to art books…and it seemed like paint had ended even on some of the walls.</p>
<p>The dark-haired girl took them to a room which from the looks of it was her studio.<br/>“You don’t mind if we talk while I put away some of my things right?” she told the two, even if the situation seemed quite urgent, Ina appeared calm.</p>
<p>“It’s all right.” Replied the blonde.<br/>The room was rather clean compared to the rest of what they saw, but there were still a lot of objects scattered around, at the center of it there, an almost complete painting of two blonde girls.</p>
<p>“Could you tell us, did you visit a store called ‘The Golden Diamond’ in the last 4 months?” was the first thing Gura asked.</p>
<p>“I did, around…3 months ago? Yeah 3 months.” Came the reply.</p>
<p>“And you bought a long-sleeved gray shirt, correct?” <br/>“I did, my boss gave me the money and asked to grab it for him” <br/>“Boss?” was what both Watson and Gura asked at the same time.<br/>“Yeah, I worked at a company called Ancient Ones, it founded many marine researches...I used to be a secretary, but sometimes I would get sent off to do some errands.” She explained.</p>
<p>Amelia immediately grabbed her notebook and wrote down every bit of information she was given.<br/>“You said worked…so did you get fired or…” continued to question the shark-girl.<br/>“I left around a 2 months ago, that job wasn’t my passion…”<br/>“I can see, you seem to enjoy art a lot” commented Gura, staring at the semi-finished painting.</p>
<p>“I do, and it’s actually working out…I’ll soon get the chance to expose my paintings in an art gallery.” She added, holding a proud smile on her lips.<br/>“Well that’s great, back to the questions we wanted to ask…so does your boss have the shirt?” <br/>“Yes, I just paid for it with his money” she confirmed again.<br/>“What’s his name?” Asked Amelia this time, still writing down in her notebook.<br/>“His name is Lewis Moria.” They now had someone else to question.</p>
<p>“Thank you very much miss.” Said Gura, smiling at the artist.<br/>“No problem, I hope you guys solve the case…Ina flash.” After the horrifying pun, she let out a chuckle, leaving Amelia and Gura to stare at eachother awkwardly.</p>
<p>“Alright, thank you for your cooperation” Muttered the blonde, walking towards the door followed by the shark-girl.</p>
<p>Outside, Watson looked back at the notes she had taken and started thinking, the gesture caught the attention of Gura.<br/>“So, what do we do now?” <br/>“For now, let’s head back to the office…it’s getting late and we need to rest, tomorrow we’ll look for this Lewis guy and proceed from there.”</p>
<p>The shark nodded at that, and together they walked back home.</p>
<p>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>A few hours had passed and dinner was already eaten; Amelia was sitting on her office chair scribbling down some new hypothesis she thought after today’s research.<br/>Gura looked at her from afar, not wanting to bother her partner.</p>
<p>As she watched, she thought about the couple they met today.</p>
<p>Something was bothering her.<br/>She never had someone close like that, and it never really bothered her in all the years she had been alive…but now she felt a slight pang in her heart, wishing for something like that.</p>
<p>She couldn’t stop the sudden image that came to her mind…the face of Amelia.</p>
<p>Shaking her head wasn’t helping get rid of it, and trying to mentally tell herself to stop just made it all worse.<br/>‘We barely know eachother!’ was what she kept repeating in her head ‘Also she doesn’t seem to like other people’s company’.</p>
<p>Then why was she having these thoughts? </p>
<p>Watson didn’t notice the stare directed at her, distracted by her own set of thoughts.<br/>After what seemed like an eternity (which in reality was just a few minutes) the blonde stretched her arms, a small ‘hic’ leaving her body.</p>
<p>“It’s time to head to sleep…” as she got up, she walked towards her bedroom.<br/>Gura waited for her to change and then soon joined her partner as they both headed to sleep.</p>
<p>Laying on the bed, Amelia tried to close her eyes to catch some sleep…however it seemed like an impossible task at the moment… she had spent a lot of nights laying just like this, restless…when she did fall asleep she would have the tendency to wake up after a few hours, drenched in sweat after another nightmare.</p>
<p>The nightmare never changed: she would time travel and as she warped, voices would speak to her without being able to tell who was speaking; she would end up in a dock, the waves would rock and roar…and from there…she would feel something emerge from the water and a voice calling out to her before waking up.</p>
<p>She looked at her side, Gura seemed to be already asleep (even though she couldn’t see the girl’s face); the only thing she could hear was the girl snoring lightly.</p>
<p>Watson wanted to chuckle at the sight, but decided against to avoid waking up the other girl.</p>
<p>She laid on her side and kept looking at the shark with interest; her eyes beginning to feel the fatigue.<br/>A soft ‘goodnight’ escaped her lips and soon…she was asleep.<br/>Gura was actually still awake: she didn’t notice the glance that the blonde gave her but she managed to  hear the ‘goodnight’ the girl directed at her.</p>
<p>Turning around and lying on her other side she watched the girl sleep.</p>
<p>‘Pretty…’ was what she thought right before her eyes gave up and closed, leading her to dreamland.</p>
<p>During the night, Gura ended up cuddling closer to the girl with her head tucked underneath Amelia’s chin, which caused a smile to appear on the detective’s sleeping face…and an arm to be draped over the shark in a protective manner.</p>
<p>Both of the girls slept peacefully that night.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Looking for answers</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>It's time for the two detectives to pay a visit to Mr. Lewis Moria, Ina's old boss.<br/>But solving a mystery is not always easy....</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Happy new year! I hope you enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Amelia was the first one to wake up, and she immediately noticed the fact that not only did she wrap an arm around the shorter girl, but said girl was also nuzzled against her chest.</p>
<p>Her eyes were wide and, as gently as possible, she tried to remove herself from Gura without waking her up; her heart was pounding in her chest…was the shark able to hear it as well? She hoped for the contrary.<br/>Finally she managed to escape the comforting warmth they were both wrapped in and after getting out of bed she headed towards the kitchen to prepare breakfast.</p>
<p>She had just finished making tea when she heard footsteps from behind, as she turned around she was greeted with the figure of a very tired looking shark-girl rubbing her eyes…for a split second Watson taught she had never seen anyone as pretty as her at that moment.</p>
<p>But she shook her head and put that thought in the back of her head, gently greeting the other girl.<br/>Gura let out a quiet “good morning” and sat down to have breakfast; After eating and having their stomachs filled, Watson spoke “Today we are going to pay a visit to the company were Miss Ninomae worked…it’s quite far so we’ll have to take the bus.”</p>
<p>Gura had never been on a bus ever before and the idea thrilled her a bit.<br/>“Ok! Ready to leave when you are!” she replied cheerfully, looking like a child in a candy store, which caused the detective to stifle a laugh.</p>
<p>Lately she had been laughing a lot more.</p>
<p>“Alright, then let’s not waste any time” Ironic.<br/>After getting ready, the two headed out towards the bus stop (which was luckily not far from where they lived); they waited for a few minutes and finally the bus arrived: Gura’s face was priceless, unfortunately Amelia could only glance at it for a second, busy paying for the ride.</p>
<p>As she paid, she walked towards the empty seats and found the shark patting a seat right beside her excitedly: as both of them sat down the bus started driving away.<br/>There weren’t a lot of people on the ride and they were rather quiet, which made for a relaxing travel.<br/>Gura was busy looking outside the window to even mutter anything and Amelia was glancing occasionally at the other girl…she wondered how many things she had seen in Atlantis and how much of the earth she didn’t see.</p>
<p>The idea of showing her what the world had to offer didn’t sound too bad.</p>
<p>After 15 minutes they had reached their stop, both girls got down from the bus and they were greeted by an enormous building built next to the beach side; the giant logo of a cute purple octopus with an halo stood on top of the building.<br/>They walked through the entrance and greeted a young man sitting at the reception desk.</p>
<p>“Welcome to the Ancient Ones Corporation, how may I help you today?” He asked in a polite manner.<br/>“Good day, I’m detective Amelia Watson and this is my partner Gura…we would like to ask a few questions to a Mr. Moria” spoke Watson in her professional tone.</p>
<p>“May I ask the reason why?” He demanded.<br/>“We are investigating a murder and we need to talk to him.” She explained.<br/>At that, the man picked up the phone on the desk and started talking to someone in a low voice.<br/>“Two detectives are here…Yes, it’s a serious accusation…I understand.” And with that he set the phone back down.<br/>“He said you can have a talk with him in his office, but it has to be rather short…he has a packed schedule, it’s on the third floor, second door to the right” after the answer, both of the girls thanked the man and took the elevator.</p>
<p>---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>Finding the room was easy, after knocking on the door they heard a deep male voice say ‘Come in’:<br/>They were greeted by a luxurious room, decorated with elegant paintings on the walls, exotic plants, leather couches and a mini-bar…a man was sitting on one of the couches, drinking something definitely alcoholic.</p>
<p>“You are the detectives, correct?” He said staring at the two girls.<br/>Amelia nodded.<br/>“So, what did you want to ask? I have nothing to hide.” Prideful, that’s how he sounded.</p>
<p>‘Seems like he really is in a hurry…nothing to hide? We’ll see…’ thought Amelia, offering the man a smile.<br/>That wasn’t the only thing she noticed, she saw the man sneakily glancing at the shark-girl while sipping on his drink.</p>
<p>“Umh…we talked to someone who claimed that they worked for your company until 2 months ago, and they told us that they went out to a store called ‘The Golden Diamond’ to buy a piece of clothing for their boss with the money he gave them” Gura explained.</p>
<p>The man listened in silence to the girl speak.</p>
<p>“They also said that the shirt is now in your possession…we wanted to ask to see it.” She concluded.</p>
<p>“Unfortunately I don’t know what you are talking about, I never had an employee do this kind of job for me… could you please tell me the name of the person who told you this information?” he questioned, the hint of a smirk hiding in his expression.</p>
<p>Gura didn’t know what to do at that moment and the man seemed to notice the girl’s hesitation, until Watson stood in front of her partner “We cannot release this information, we’ll need to verify what you just told us” she explained, a scowl plastered onto her face.<br/>“All right” was all he replied; he headed towards his desk, opened a drawer and after going through some files, he grabbed one and handed it to the blonde.<br/>“Here’s a list with all my employees, past and present” he told.<br/>“Since you mention that this person apparently worked for me, you should find them here…” he continued with a smirk.</p>
<p>Watson wanted to scowl at him but restrained herself and just opened the file allowing the other girl to see the content inside as well.</p>
<p>Making a rough approximation, Amelia guessed there were over 5000 people that had worked for this company, luckily for them all of the names were in alphabetical order; after skipping through the names the detective decided to take another look…the name Ninomae Ina’nis didn’t appear.</p>
<p>‘Did she lie or did he?’ she wondered.</p>
<p>“Have you found anything useful?” Mr. Moria asked.<br/>“…It seems not, excuse us for the intrusion.” Answered the blonde, handing back the file to the man, who in the meantime made a smile appear on his face.<br/>“I hope the investigation will proceed well detective, now if you’ll excuse me…I need to get back to work.” He finally told them, gesturing them towards the door.</p>
<p>Amelia nodded and after a final ‘Goodbye’ her and Gura walked out…but none of the girls saw the man threw one last look at the shark.</p>
<p>It was time for them to get back to the office.</p>
<p>-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>The ride back seemed less exciting for both of them: Watson seemed to have her thoughts fixated on something else and Gura stared worryingly at the blonde.<br/>After reaching their destination, they walked back home…the weird silence that was present during the ride didn’t go away.</p>
<p>Amelia headed towards her desk, placing her notebook on it and sitting down in her leather chair; she stared blankly at the book, her mind still racing and thinking about the case.</p>
<p>It was a rare occurrence for her: many of the cases the blonde had taken were relatively easy to figure out, the ones that were more challenging? She could count them on one hand, she held her head for a second, a headache setting in.</p>
<p>The shark wanted to say something to try and help the girl, but refrained in doing so.</p>
<p>Suddenly, an idea popped in her mind: she headed towards the kitchen.<br/>She had never cooked before in her entire life, back in Atlantis she used to eat raw fish and meat…but she had seen Amelia cook a few times and was confident enough in her observing skills.</p>
<p>10 minutes later, the only thing she managed to not burn was the water.<br/>‘Maybe I should throw this awa-‘ <br/>“What is this?” her thought was interrupted by Watson’s voice, who suddenly manifested herself behind her, causing the shark to let out a loud ‘Eek!’.</p>
<p>“I-I tried to cook something for you…b-but it’s ok! It probably tastes horrible I will throw-“<br/>“Let me at least taste it before doing that.” Commented the blonde, grabbing the plate from the blue-haired girl: the meal was supposed to be salmon with boiled potatoes, but it definitely didn’t look like it.</p>
<p>Amelia sat down and after cutting a piece from the salmon she put it in her mouth.<br/>‘…I expected worse, if you get over the burnt taste…it’s not too bad’ she told herself; Meanwhile Gura had her jaw on the floor, shocked by the detective’s courage.</p>
<p>But her jaw was about to break the wooden floor when she saw that the blonde kept eating, ‘She’s gonna die’ she kept telling herself.<br/>Watson finished eating and her glance moved from the plate to the shark “Well, for a first time it wasn’t too bad, I’m still alive’ she commented with a small smirk; the shorter girl blushed in embarrassment but was glad that the detective wasn’t dead.</p>
<p>The blush grew even more when said detective got up from her spot and patted her head, muttering a ‘you did good’ in a soft and proud voice.</p>
<p>“I-I will head to sleep now!” was all Gura managed to mumble, and hastily headed to the bedroom…hiding under the blankets.<br/>The gesture made Watson chuckle ‘How cute…’, she headed back to her desk and, feeling less tired, began making theories about the case again.</p>
<p>A restless night for both of them.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Protection</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The investigation seemed to have reached an halt, but Amelia's tendencies to keep on working managed to discover an interesting bit of information from 2 years ago...</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hope you enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Morning came slowly for Gura, who didn’t get even a wink of sleep…hiding her whole body under the heavy blankets and with one thought always running through her shark brain. </p>
<p>‘SHE PATTED MY HEAD!’</p>
<p>But with the sun rising, she realized that Amelia hadn’t gone to sleep.<br/>She removed the blankets from herself and got up, walking towards were she had last seen the detective…and there she was, still sitting at her desk…however she didn’t appear fatigued, on the contrary she seemed even more energized than last night.</p>
<p>“Ame?”  <br/>The blonde looked up from the paper she was writing down on, and was met with a very tired looking Gura: her hair disheveled, dark circles under her eyes and she also noticed how her right shoulder wasn’t covered by her hoodie like usual…and it was really low.</p>
<p>Normally she wouldn’t be moved by the sight, but the fact that the person standing in front of her was Gura made it a whole different story, immediately blushing and trying to hide her red tainted cheeks.<br/>“U-umh…Gura…your clothes…” she coughed out, forcing herself to keep her eyes away from the girl.</p>
<p>The shark had a questioning expression on her, not understanding what the blonde wanted to say; she lowered her gaze and after a solid 5 seconds noticed the state she was in: she didn’t have a bra.<br/>Letting out a shrill she hastily pulled her hoodie back in place and turned around, giving her back to the other girl…she wanted to die from the embarrassment .</p>
<p>Amelia coughed again “You...are you okay now?” <br/>“Y-yeah…”<br/>“Good…u-umh…anyway, I wanted to talk about the case” after she managed to restrain herself, a serious expression made its way back to her face.</p>
<p>Gura moved on from all the awkwardness and finally turned around “Did you have an intuition?” she asked.</p>
<p>“Something like that…yesterday did you notice anything off about Mr. Moria?” Watson questioned.<br/>“Well…he seemed pretty confident in the fact he was innocent, but it did seem like he was hiding something.” The shark explained.<br/>“But there is also the fact that Miss Ina’s name didn’t appear in the list of old employees so…” it really was a complicated situation, she didn’t want to believe that the artist had lied to them.</p>
<p>“Indeed, it could be that the Miss might’ve lied…but the first suspect is Mr. Moria.” <br/>“Eh? But we don’t have anything to prove he’s guilty though…” Gura was wondering how Amelia was so confident in this statement.<br/>“Moria’s company is not small, I heard his name in the past but I didn’t really pay attention to it…” she started explaining “I looked through some old things...and I found this.” As she spoke, she threw a newspaper on her desk, gesturing Gura to take it.</p>
<p>‘Luckily I have the bad habit to keep all of the newspaper I get’ she thought to herself, a huge pile of said papers laid next to a bookshelf.</p>
<p>The shark looked carefully at what she had been given: it was a newspaper from 2 years ago, but what got her attention was the front page title: “BODY DISCOVERED AT ANCIENT ONES COMPANY - Employee found dead, police thinks of a possible suicide.” Right under it, was a picture of a body lying on the ground, covered by a white sheet; a police officer was keeping a woman away from it.</p>
<p>“This…!” <br/>“The police claimed the man, George Pendragon, committed suicide, but before that…the first suspect was Mr. Moria himself.” Explained the blonde, walking towards her partner.<br/>“Was it really suicide?” <br/>“That’s the problem…you see that woman in the pic? She is the man’s wife, in an interview she kept claiming that he would’ve never done something like that…” Gura was listening carefully, her eyes never leaving the newspaper.</p>
<p>“So I thought we could have a talk with Miss Pendragon…for now we don’t have any other lead.” <br/>The shark nodded, finally removing her stares from the paper; Amelia had gotten her house address by looking at the phone book by searching the woman’s surname.<br/>After getting ready, they headed out to take the bus towards the house.</p>
<p>---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>The house was inside a forest in a rather isolated zone from the rest of the city, that meant the girls had to walk a little from where the bus had stopped; Gura enjoyed the quiet atmosphere…the only sounds she heard were the rustling of leaves and the chirping of birds.</p>
<p>After a few minutes of walking they saw the house, even if surrounded by trees it was very much visible…smoke was coming out of the chimney, and the lights were turned on.</p>
<p>They walked to the front door and knocked and they didn’t wait for long for someone to open the door: the woman in the picture, she looked older but it was indeed her; Miss Pendragon stared at the two girls and gently said “Yes?”.</p>
<p>“Miss Pendragon? I am detective Amelia Watson and this is my partner Gura…we would like to ask you some questions that could be useful for our investigation…” Watson took a break “…It’s related to what happened to your husband.” The woman’s eyes widened, her eyes seemed to hold back tears.<br/>“I-I see, come in…”</p>
<p>They were all seated on the couches, it was clear to everyone in the room that the woman was feeling uncomfortable…Gura began feeling sad for her.<br/>“Miss, we know this must be really hard for you…but we wanted to know more about what happened to your husband…” Amelia explained, trying to be as tactful as possible.</p>
<p>“He…He was a hard worker, always doing his best…he had gotten a job at the Ancient Ones company as a supervisor, he worked there for almost a year…” Miss Pendragon was trying her best to not let the sadness overtake her.<br/>“He didn’t talk much about what he actually did there, but he always seemed worried whenever he would come back home…the day before his death…he confessed he wanted to have a chat with his boss…Lewis Moria.” Both of the girls were quietly concentrated on what the woman was saying.</p>
<p>“But…h-he didn’t…” the phrase was cut by sobs breaking through, the woman’s face now covered by her hands in desperation.</p>
<p>Gura felt a pang in her heart: losing someone…it sounded like a wound that would never heal.<br/>She instinctively looked at her partner, wondering how she would feel if she was left alone…and how Amelia would feel if something were to happen to her.<br/>The blonde kept a rather unreadable expression, her mouth was in a straight line…her eyes had a hidden empathy towards Miss Pendragon but Gura didn’t manage to notice…it was different from other times Amelia had been in the same situation.</p>
<p>Gura could barely register the movement of Watson’s eyes, that lingered on her for barely a second before looking back at the crying woman.<br/>“…We understand, do you remember anything else?” Asked the blonde.</p>
<p>The woman finally managed to stop the stream of tears and grabbed a tissue to wash away the ones that were left on the corners of her eyes; “I…I remember when I was called by the police and I saw…” she didn’t need to specify what she meant “The police told me he had…shot himself…on the right side of his head but…”</p>
<p>“But…?” <br/>“…He was left-handed” <br/>Amelia’s eyes widened a little.<br/>“The police just dismissed this fact…” Miss Pendragon commented with not-so hidden anger.</p>
<p>Watson was now staring at nothing in particular with her fingers crossed in front of her face, her mind racing with countless ideas and thoughts.<br/>The woman stared at the detective, waiting for her to break the silence created after she stopped talking, but it seemed like the blonde was too absorbed in her thinking.</p>
<p>“Thank you Miss for the cooperation, you helped us a lot.” Amelia snapped out of the trance she had been trapped herself in and looked at her partner who just spoke, she exhaled and got up from the couch; “Thank you, this information will definitely be useful to us.” After the detective thanked the woman, Gura followed her exact movement.<br/>Amelia gently put a hand on her partner’s back and gestured her outside, and together they headed out towards their home.</p>
<p>Miss Pendragon followed them until the front door and from there she spoke one final time “Be careful…”.</p>
<p>------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>Back at the office, Amelia was sitting back at her desk, rubbing her eyes from the tiredness that suddenly seemed to have made its way in her body.<br/>Meanwhile the shark was feeling rather hungry, they had been out most of the morning and it was now lunch time already so she decided to make something for herself and the detective: easier said than done.</p>
<p>She had 0 experience in cooking stuff that wasn’t meat, her only hope in doing something that could be considered ‘edible’ was a couple of eggs and sausages…enough for two people.<br/>She began cooking and, despite almost burning everything again, she managed to pull together a decent looking meal; she gave a bite to her portion of sausage and eggs and it actually tasted okay!<br/>After she gave herself a mental high-five she walked towards her partner with both plates, hoping to surprise the girl but instead she was met with a tired detective taking a nap with her head laying on her crossed arms on the desk.</p>
<p>She stared at the blonde for just a second: her breaths were soft and regular, the hair on her face cascading in front of her eyes that were gently closed.<br/>Gura had never seen the detective’s face while she was sleeping (usually the blonde would wake up before her) and she decided that she quite enjoyed the sight.</p>
<p>She decided to put Watson’s plate in the fridge so she could eat it later, she needed the rest after overworking herself.<br/>‘How often does she end up like this..?’ she wondered, to Gura it seemed like the detective was putting her job before her well-being.<br/>She headed to the bedroom and looked around for something that would keep Amelia warm while resting, and after searching around in a drawer managed to get a fluffy blanket.</p>
<p>She silently walked back to where the other girl was sleeping and gently laid the blanket on her shoulders, making sure she was covered well enough.</p>
<p>With nothing else left to do Gura decided to sit on the couch not too far away from the desk: her head tilted up and staring at the ceiling, her mind strangely drifting back to the crying woman’s face.<br/>It had been a few years since her husband died and she was still grieving…how can someone ever recover from that? </p>
<p>‘Ame had such a serious expression back then…I mean, she’s always serious on the job but…’ she started thinking.<br/>‘I wonder how she feels…’ her eyes were beginning to close, her head now tilted towards Amelia; one last blink…and she was out like a light.</p>
<p>-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>Amelia woke up when the sun had already set, sweat covering her forehead and her breathing accelerated.</p>
<p>It was the usual nightmare, but this time it was different…it felt different: she had been standing on the same dock, the wind had picked up and the waves stronger than ever…the voice that had been calling out to her was coming from behind, but as she turned around to look the only thing she could register was the sound of a gunshot and Gura’s scream.</p>
<p>After that she definitely couldn’t go back to sleeping, a headache setting in.<br/>She felt something warm on her back and noticed the blanket; by instinct she glanced around the room and saw the shark (who now was laying on the couch) sleeping peacefully.</p>
<p>‘It was just a nightmare…she’s ok’ with a sigh, she walked towards the girl, sitting on the empty spot the sleepy girl wasn’t currently occupying.<br/>She gently caressed her blue and white hair, the gesture made her feel more calm and almost made her forget about the dream.</p>
<p>Almost.</p>
<p>As she sat there, unsure about the future…there was only one thing she had no doubt on: </p>
<p>‘I will protect you’.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Don't leave me behind</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>After getting some well deserved rest, Amelia has to talk to Gura...</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hope you enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Gura was snoring quietly, her head resting on a rather soft pillow…</p><p>A dream kept her from waking up: it started rather normally, she had woken up and was headed towards the kitchen per usual…she opened the fridge to get some milk but at that exact moment she felt a pair of arms sneak around her.</p><p>She clicked her tongue in a jokingly manner “Ame…”<br/>“Mh? I’m not doing anything…”<br/>“You know lying is bad detective” she added with a chuckle.<br/>“I can’t help it, you’re too cute when I tease you…” commented the blonde, sneaking a kiss on the shorter girl’s cheek.</p><p>Unfortunately the dream couldn’t last forever and Gura blinked.<br/>Her vision was very blurry, but she realized that it was late ‘Did I sleep the whole afternoon?’ she thought.<br/>Before having the chance to get up, she felt something warm on her head, lightly caressing her…she also noticed her head was laying on something.<br/>She raised her head a bit and her gaze met Amelia’s.</p><p>The two girls stared at each other, it took a solid 10 seconds for the shark to realize the situation she was in: she was laying her head on Amelia’s thighs, and said blonde was also stroking her head.</p><p>Gura’s face became so red she believed it was made of lava.</p><p>Watson chuckled at the sight and finally stopped caressing her “Morning, slept well?” technically the shark did sleep well, but her brain seemed to have shut down from the shock, not only because of the dream but because of the current circumstances.</p><p>“I-I slept normally!” the words came out like a machine gun blasting every bullet, as Gura immediately moved herself away from the comfiest pillow she ever had the chance of sleeping on.</p><p>A smirk appeared on the detective’s lips.<br/>“Well that’s good…” a silence engulfed them, Amelia was still sitting on the couch, her eyes now closed; the shark glanced at the blonde, not knowing what to say after that awkward atmosphere…her heart had started beating rapidly and she wondered if the other girl could hear it as loudly as her.</p><p>“I have a plan to find out what Mr. Moria is hiding.” Suddenly, Watson spoke.<br/>“I’ll infiltrate the company’s building and look for-“<br/>“Wait…you?” Gura’s eyes started filling with worry.<br/>“I can’t have you enter the building, it’s too dangerous-“<br/>“It’s dangerous anyway! What if you get found out?!” Anger slipped through.<br/>“I don’t want to take any risk! You need to stay behind!” Watson’s tone began to raise, showing worry and what seemed to be…desperation.</p><p>Time travel was a last resource, in case things went bad for her…and if she were to use it, the blonde knew it would mess up the timeline.</p><p>Amelia was still fixated in not telling the shorter girl about who she really was, hiding the truth was always easier to her.</p><p>“SHUT UP!” Watson was taken back by the yell, eyes wide and mouth now tight shut.<br/>“If we are together we can protect each other! You don’t have to go alone…!” Gura tried to reason, tears were starting to well up in the corner of her eyes.<br/>She walked closer towards the couch the blonde was still sitting on and grabbed her by the collar of her shirt.<br/>“You keep helping me, over and over again even though we haven’t known each other for long…but you seem to not even care about yourself!”</p><p>It was a harsh truth, but still the truth: Watson had always this tendency of not really caring about herself…from getting into dangerous situations to just avoid sorting her feelings.</p><p>Gura leaned her head on the other girl’s chest, tears now rolling down her cheek and onto the blonde’s shirt “Please…don’t leave me behind…” she spoke with a broken whisper, there was a hidden and unspoken truth behind that statement.<br/>The shark had been alone for a long time, even before leaving Atlantis; now that she had someone beside her…she feared loneliness more than anything else.</p><p>The detective looked down at the girl currently sobbing quietly, a pain in her chest suddenly rising.<br/>Only one time she had found herself in a situation like this: murder of a family, the sole survivor was the mother who had been injured.<br/>When Amelia came to question the woman, she was engulfed in the woman’s arms as she cried in desperation…at that time she wasn’t surprised or even affected by it, but she had consoled the woman at the best of her abilities.</p><p>But now? This was a whole different story.<br/>She felt like someone was squeezing her heart and not letting go, and the pain kept growing as Gura kept on weeping onto her, between the sobs Watson could hear her mumbling “please…”</p><p>With a heavy sigh, the detective embraced the shark in a tight hug, her head resting on top of the other girl.</p><p>“Sorry…” was all the blonde said as she held the girl into her arms and caressed her back: they stayed like in that position for a long while, Gura sitting on Amelia’s lap sobbing while the blonde comforted her; the pocket watch ticked off at midnight and by that time the shark wasn’t sobbing anymore and the flow of tears had finally stopped.</p><p>Watson gently wiped away some tears that remained on the corner of the short girl’s eyes with her thumb and then softly asked “Do you feel better now?”.<br/>Gura nodded silently while not looking directly at the blonde “I’m sorry…I was just-“ ‘Afraid’ “…worried” she still couldn’t admit the truth about how she felt.</p><p>“I am worried about you as well…” This made Watson’s heart skip a beat.<br/>“So please…take me with you” she was now looking at the detective, a serious look on her face; Amelia sighed again with a sad smile.<br/>“Alright…but you need to stay close to me and if things get dangerous you book it, alright?” <br/>“Yes!” Gura instinctively hugged Watson tight, her tail appearing from under the hoodie that hid it for a long time and wagging like a puppy.</p><p>“We will go tomorrow night, first we need to grab a few things and rest…we’ll wait until all of the workers leave the company and find a way to enter the building.” Explained Amelia after the hug with the shorter girl.</p><p>The shark thought for a few seconds…<br/>“Oh! What if we enter through the sewers?” She proposed, remembering how she managed to get into the butcher’s shop.<br/>Watson eye’s widened at the idea, she remembered she had a map of the city laying around somewhere in her office so she began searching.<br/>After searching in every drawer she managed to find some blueprints: one of the buildings, one of the railway system and one of them was a blueprint of the city’s sewers system; it was rather old but she hoped it would still be somewhat useful.</p><p>Gura walked closer and together they looked to see if there was indeed an access.<br/>Luck was on their side today, there was a sewer that went under the Ancient Ones building and popped up right in the main hall.<br/>“It might be closed off but that’s our best bet right now…Great thinking Gura!” Commented Amelia, patting the shark girl on her head.</p><p>The girls then looked at each other in silent agreement: tomorrow they were going to break in the building.</p><p>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.</p><p>“Wait that’s illegal”.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. The infiltration</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The girls prepare to sneak into the Ancient Ones building, hoping to find if Mr. Moria is hiding something.<br/>They know it won't be easy, but they have no other choice.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I made a new twitter account! if you want give me a follow @13MON4 were I will post the updates on this fic and other stories.<br/>Hope you enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The day of the infiltration had come.</p><p>Early in the morning the two girls headed out to a hardware store to buy some things for the operation: a rope, gloves, a crowbar and a camera. <br/>Amelia knew the man working at the store, a rather young man named Yagoo who had come into the city to follow his dream to become a manager for young talents…what was the name? Idols? Amelia didn’t understand much but she admired his perseverance.</p><p>He didn’t bat an eye when he saw the detective and the shorter girl buy those items, he had often seen the detective enter the shop and buy many tools; she had once told him she liked to fix things on her own (which was indeed true).</p><p>After the purchase, the girls headed back home to prepare: they would wait until it was dark out then enter the sewers that were behind their house, walk through it and pop inside the building; the walk would be long, but it was also the safest way to reach the place.</p><p>The sun had set and the detective and her partner headed towards the house’s back, Amelia was carrying a small backpack with most of the objects they bought while Gura held a flashlight and the map of the sewers.</p><p>They opened the manhole, paying attention to their surroundings and as they climbed down the foul smell hit Watson like a truck meanwhile the shark didn’t seem to bothered by it.<br/>“How can you even stand this stench?” Asked the detective, pinching her nose to try and block the smell.<br/>“Well the smell was too much when I first entered the sewers but now I’ve gotten used to it” she shrugged, illuminating the way in front of them.</p><p>They walked for a long while, the only sounds echoing through the tunnels were the sound of water flowing and the faint echo of their footsteps.<br/>“This is it.” Muttered Gura in the lowest volume possible, her flashlight pointed upwards where metal stairs headed towards another manhole.<br/>“Alright…I’ll open it.” The detective put down the backpack and grabbed the crowbar inside of it.</p><p>She climbed the stairs and, with some difficulty, managed to put enough strength to remove the manhole.<br/>She peeked her head out and saw that they were indeed inside the Ancient Ones building, the lights were turned off and no one was around as they predicted.</p><p>Amelia gestured to the shark that it was okay to move up and finally climbed out, reaching a hand out to help the shorter girl.<br/>Gura climbed up and grabbed the blonde’s hand and finally both of them were inside the building.</p><p>“Let’s head to Mr. Moria’s office first.” Watson spoke in a whisper, to which the shark nodded.<br/>They quietly made their way towards the room who was unfortunately locked.</p><p>“Crap, now what?” <br/>Amelia expected this and came prepared; she removed a bobby pin from her hair and after bending it she stuck it inside the lock.<br/>Gura was left wide eyed not expecting the detective to know how to pick locks…but then she remembered the fact that this whole situation was quite surreal and her surprise vanished away.</p><p>A minute passed and finally the door was opened; the girls entered the room and began looking around:<br/>They were very careful in their search, avoiding messes and carefully putting back all the objects that they didn’t need; as Gura was about to walk towards the bookshelf in the room, she noticed something on the floor.</p><p>“Ame…” the blonde put away a stack of papers she was reading and turned around, looking in the direction of the shark; said girl was pointing the flashlight onto the wooden floor where marks appeared next to the sofa they had been sitting on during their first visit.<br/>They weren’t too evident, only with the right lighting you could notice them.</p><p>“Help me move the couch.” Whispered Watson as she walked towards one side of the sofa, Gura did the same on the opposite side and with their combined effort they managed to move it.</p><p>Hidden under the couch was a wooden trap door.<br/>Gura gulped from the nervousness and looked at the detective, who was now holding a smirk on her lips;<br/>‘You didn’t have anything to hide eh?’ she thought to herself, gently opening the door and looking inside.<br/>She saw another ladder but this time she couldn’t really see where it headed, but it appeared as the hole grew wider once inside.</p><p>“I’ll go first, stay close to me.” Muttered the detective.</p><p>As she managed quite snugly to enter through the trap door, Gura began following close behind and closed the hatch as they both started their descent.</p><p>---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</p><p>The hole seemed to go down for around 30 meters and as the hatch had closed, some lights located on the opposite side of the ladder slowly started lighting up making the place brighter.<br/>After carefully reaching the end of the ladder, Amelia looked at Gura who was slightly behind her “You good?” she spoke in a low voice, the sound echoing all around.</p><p>“Y-yeah I just need to…” stepping on one of the ladder’s steps Gura’s foot slipped and she fell backward; Watson ‘s eyes widened and opened her arms catching the girl falling, they both ended up on the ground but luckily the shark didn’t get hurt.</p><p>“A! SORRY!!” yelled in a whisper the shortest girl hurriedly getting off Amelia; the blonde got back on her feet and wiped some dust and dirt away from her clothes “It’s all right, now…” the detective looked around and found a corridor on the opposite side from where they had come down.</p><p>“Let’s keep going.” </p><p>The path in front of them was beginning to light up as they kept on walking, Gura’s instincts began making her feel more agitated, her senses heightening and focusing on every sound or smell she could perceive.<br/>Amelia glanced at the girl right beside her, noticing her behavior had changed compared to a few seconds before.<br/>She was growing worried but she had the capacity to hide it; they kept on walking for only a few minutes and suddenly they noticed the end of the corridor and the start of what they assumed was a room.</p><p>With a hand gesture, the detective asked for the flashlight from the shark and as soon as she had it in her hands she pointed it towards the room who was engulfed in darkness: it looked like a storage room…a big room filled with wooden crates and boxes of various types.<br/>Amelia looked for a switch and, as she found it, she flipped it and the entire room was filled with light.</p><p>Gura looked at the detective with worry filled eyes, her instincts screaming that there was something wrong about this place.<br/>The detective opened one of the crates with the crowbar and saw objects related to chemistry: beakers, test tubes and some microscopes.</p><p>She suddenly remembered what Ina had told them during the interrogation a few days ago, about the Ancient Ones business side…the artist probably never knew about this hidden place.<br/>It was time to get to the bottom of this.</p><p>As Gura was walking towards one of the boxes to inspect it, she perceived a smell she was rather familiar with coming from a locked door on the left side of the room…the smell of blood.</p><p>“A-ame, something really bad is going on…” <br/>The blonde closed the crate and walked towards the shark, who now had a shocked and scared expression on her.<br/>“What do you mean?” she asked, gently putting a hand on the shorter girl’s shoulder.</p><p>Gura just gestured towards the closed metal door; Amelia didn’t quite understand what the girl meant but she trusted her, she looked at the handle and saw the lock that was keeping the door closed off.<br/>First she tried picking the lock but unfortunately the bobby pin ended up breaking, she then sighed and decided to go for a different approach and grabbed the crowbar.</p><p>‘It will make a lot of noise but I have no choice’ she thought to herself and began hitting the lock with it, using all of her strength.<br/>After just a few hits, the lock broke and fell to the floor…the sound echoing through the room.</p><p>She quietly opened the door and was met with a horrible sight.</p><p>An operating table covered in blood, medical tools on a table beside it, more of those chemistry objects and what appeared to be a furnace.</p><p>“Jesus…” was the only comment that escaped the blonde’s lips, a stench of iron, blood and coal made its way into her nose as soon as she entered the hellish place.<br/>She walked around and immediately started taking pictures of what they had discovered, opening the furnace she noticed that the fire was still burning and with the crowbar she decided to try and find if there was something burning.</p><p>As she stuck it inside she tapped around to feel for solid materials and drag them towards the outside.<br/>She managed to hit something hard and…something else; immediately she began dragging it and what fell to the floor was a piece of human skull and a still burning gray shirt.</p><p>‘The fire is still on…’</p><p>Her thoughts and focus were interrupted by a thud and she instantly turned around seeing Gura laying on the floor…unconscious.<br/>“GURA-“  before she could even call out her name, she felt something prick the back of her neck and her vision began to fog; she fell on her knees as she started breathing heavily…trying to reach out to the shark.</p><p>She tried to keep her eyes open, her body now laying on the ground and feeling heavy. She tried to crawl but her arms and legs gave out instantly; with the vision now panning out she could barely see the shoes now in front of her vision…but before her vision turned dark, she managed to hear a voice she recognized speak to her.</p><p>“You made a grave mistake by taking this case…Detective Watson.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Confessions</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Waking up in an unfamiliar place, the girls find out who attacked them and ask for a confession...</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Follow me on twitter if you want: @13MON4, Hope you enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>A high-ringing pitch was the first thing Amelia was able to hear, her eyes closed tight from the headache that was rising and from the tiredness.<br/>She let out a shaky breath that managed to make her feel slightly better and opened her eyes slowly, vision as foggy as when she fell unconscious; the need to massage her temples was killing her and as she tried to reach her head with a hand she immediately realized her hands were tightly bound behind her back in handcuffs</p>
<p>She struggled to free herself, but with how tired she felt it was all for nothing.</p>
<p>Her ears started picking up more noises and her vision was less blurry, looking in front of her she noticed the room a little better: It looked like a prison cell, gray walls, no windows and a big metal door.<br/>She raised her head a bit higher and finally she heard a familiar voice (even if muffled).</p>
<p>“…Me…Ame..!”<br/>That immediately made her snap back to reality and remember what had happened, her eyes darting around trying to look for the owner of the voice.</p>
<p>“G-gura..!” she saw the shorter girl sitting on the floor, hands behind her back like the blonde and her eyes filled with worry and fear; the detective noticed that she was sitting on the ground as well and, with the little energy she regained, tried to move closer to the girl but unfortunately Watson hadn’t seen the figure right behind her and was immediately stopped by a punch to the face that made her fall on her side.</p>
<p>“AME!” the blonde tasted blood in her mouth but she didn’t care as the safety of the shark was more important to her, she coughed and glanced at who had hit her and saw another familiar face.<br/>“Now now detective, I’d suggest keeping still.” Spoke Mr. Moria, walking beside the shortest of the girls “Otherwise…” and as he continued, he grabbed a fistful of the shark’s hair, causing a yelp to emerge from her lips.</p>
<p>“DON’T FUCKING TOUCH HER!” hatred began rising into the blonde’s heart as she stared in anger at the man currently causing pain to her partner.</p>
<p>“Then behave…don’t worry though, you won’t get killed.” He concluded, his hand leaving the shark’s hair.</p>
<p>“What the hell is going on here?” asked the detective, trying to get back into a sitting position.<br/>“Mh…where do you want me to start from?” came Moria’s question.<br/>“From the beginning.”<br/>The man chuckled and kneeled down in front of Amelia to speak to her eye to eye “You see…on paper, my company founded many researches related to the sea’s wildlife…but underneath the building there is a private sector that only some of the workers here know about…” he began explaining.</p>
<p>“Do you believe in god, detective?” he then suddenly asked, the blonde staring with a hint of caution.<br/>“I don’t believe in anything else besides logic.” Came quick the answer, but she and Gura where left surprised when the man suddenly laughed.</p>
<p>“I am not surprised” he commented, looking at Watson with a look that seemed to claim superiority.<br/>“Let me tell you this…God exists and I have talked with them.” </p>
<p>Now Amelia thought the man was in a state of delirancy but she kept quiet and kept on listening to his rambles.</p>
<p>“They like to be called ‘Ancient Ones’, they’ve been existing as long as earth was created…a being formed from multiples, some people in the past have made legends involving it and it’s mostly described as a sea monster.” </p>
<p>Amelia glanced at Gura and saw that the girl had a horrified expression on her face.</p>
<p>“Anyway, the Ancient Ones spoke to me many years ago and in exchange of my help…it gave me everything!”<br/>“How did you help?” interrupted the detective.<br/>“It needed a new vessel…someone to gain their power and succeed them, it’s not an eternal being and its life is about to reach an end…but if there were vessels it’s legacy would never cease.” </p>
<p>“T-that’s insane!” Perked up Gura, a look of fear still etched onto her face, the man only chuckled in response.</p>
<p>“With what he gave me I created this company and only a handful of people that work here know of this…I would find people, possible vessels, and lure them with false promises and knock them out.  After that I’d bring them down here and the Ancient Ones would tell me if they were worthy vessels…if not, they’d end up tortured for the pleasure of the God and then used as sacrifices.”</p>
<p>Gura felt like throwing up, her face pale and drenched in cold sweat.</p>
<p>“Then one day Mr. Pendragon, one of the few people working at this project, had a change of heart and tried to convince me to stop with this…how unfortunate.”</p>
<p>“So it was you who killed him…” Commented Gura, remembering the desperation of Miss Pendragon, anger building up inside of her, gritting her teeth to the man who had just confessed.<br/>“Yes, it was necessary…after the police investigation that classified the case as a suicide things went as usual…until a week ago.”</p>
<p>The girls stared in silence.</p>
<p>“I had a guy that worked as a mediator, he’d talk to the possible vessels and they’d come to me. He came here to talk about payments…he wanted far more than I was accepting to pay and threatened to go to the police…I told him I’d pay him in another location to avoid suspicions since he was a convicted criminal.</p>
<p>We met in a forest far from the company and there I planned on killing him, however he came prepared and tried to defend himself; he ran towards a barn and I followed him, he tried to attack me with a branding iron but I managed to injure him and then I grabbed an axe and chopped his head off…<br/>then I ran away as soon as possible to avoid being found out but I guess I was too hasty and left traces.” finally he concluded, an irritated appeared at the mention of his mistakes.</p>
<p>“How did you know we’d be here?”<br/>“I actually didn’t know, my plan was to kidnap the shark…but you guys made it even easier for me, luckily I have a well-hidden security system”</p>
<p>“How much blood have you spilled over this nonsense?”</p>
<p>The man didn’t answer the detective’s question, a smirk appearing on his face to taunt her.<br/>“I guess that I got lucky though…the Ancient Ones now finally have a vessel…” and as he spoke, he stared at the shark girl.</p>
<p>Amelia now began panicking for the first time in her life, desperation filling her heart as she tried to free herself from the bindings “DON’T YOU DARE YOU SCUM!” she screamed, her lungs hurting from the strain.<br/>“Oh don’t worry, you have a use as well, while your friend gets to earn the power of the Ancient Ones…you will be the God’s last meal.” </p>
<p>Amelia was now sure she had to use her time-traveling device, but unfortunately she couldn’t feel it in her pocket; Moria noticed the way Watson was looking around “Detective…the Ancient Ones know what you two are and I already took precautions” and with that he extracted from his jacket the pocket watch that belonged to Amelia, dangling it in front of her face as to taunt her.</p>
<p>Amelia’s face fell.<br/>The only way to escape this situation was now in the hands of the enemy.</p>
<p>“For now, I need to prepare everything for the Ancient Ones…don’t try any funny businesses or…” and with that phrase he showed them a gun he had in one of his pants pockets “…someone’s going to end up hurt.” <br/>And with that final threat, he exited the room and closed the door, locking it behind him.</p>
<p>As soon as he was out, Gura managed to shakily get on her feet and walk towards the detective to check on her.<br/>Watson again tried to break the handcuffs but to no vail and cursed:</p>
<p>“FUCK!” Gura looked worriedly at the blonde, said girl heaved and panted...she saw no hope of escaping, or at least of saving her partner.<br/>Her head fell forward and her bangs hid her face, she bit her lower lip in frustration to the point of bleeding, the shark noticed a red droplet falling onto the floor and a sad smile appeared onto her face, tears threatening to fall.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry…I’m so…sorry…It’s all my fault…” the detective didn’t even look at the shorter girl as she spoke.</p>
<p>“I-it’s not…I should’ve paid attention when we entered the room-“ <br/>“I TOOK YOU WITH ME!” a tone of anger towards herself rose in the detective’s chest “…and I can’t save you…” </p>
<p>The shark got in front of the detective “It’s not your fault…he would’ve tried to kidnap me anyway.” She tried comforting the blonde, believing that she couldn’t have done anything.</p>
<p>“I….” Watson didn’t want to lie to the girl anymore.<br/>“I am a time-traveler.”</p>
<p>Gura looked in disbelief at the blonde “E-eh?” it seemed like she couldn’t grasp what the detective meant with that statement.<br/>“What…?” <br/>“I am a detective but I’m also a time-traveler…my pocket watch is the device that allows me to do so…” </p>
<p>Gura didn’t know how to feel, confused and shocked by the revelation.<br/>It seemed hard to believe, but she was a shark from Atlantis so it didn’t seem like an impossible thing “Why…why didn’t you tell me..?” she wondered, trying to see the blonde’s eyes through her bangs.<br/>“I never told anyone and there’s a reason why…” the shark listened with great attention, the detective sighed and continued speaking.<br/>“Time traveling sounds simple enough but unfortunately the reality is much different…when I warp to another time there’s already a change happening in the timeline, if I went to the past and made grave alterations it would mean changing the life of people…” she went quiet for a second “I avoid getting deeply involved with people for this reason, I have no right to interfere in their destiny...but…I was willing to use time-travel if it meant I could save you.” She explained with sorrow filled eyes.</p>
<p>“To avoid involving you in this mess I got us in…I would’ve made sure to never pick up that call from the butcher so we could never meet and then I would be the only one stuck here in this hellish place” she concluded, finally revealing the truth.<br/>Gura gasped, tears now freely falling from her face.</p>
<p>“So…you wanted to remove yourself from my memories…?” her voice was barely louder than a whisper, a heavy pain in her heart growing every second.<br/>Watson didn’t lift her head…her silence was enough of an answer to the shark.</p>
<p>Then all of a sudden, she received a hard head-butt that made her wince in pain.<br/>“YOU…YOU IDIOT!” Screamed Gura while sobbing profusely “I WOULD NEVER WANT TO FORGET ABOUT YOU!”<br/>Again, the detective was left speechless by the girl in front of her.</p>
<p>“I was all alone…you took me in even if I am not completely human, I-I caused you troubles but you still treated me kindly a-and put me before yourself…!” she continued speaking, not holding back her emotions.</p>
<p>“I-I would never want to forget…the girl I ended up falling in love with.”<br/>Amelia’s eyes widened at the confession, her heart seemed to stop beating for a second; for the past few days she had realized what she had begun to feel for the shorter girl but decided to ignore it (even if her heart didn’t stop accelerating in the presence of the shark).</p>
<p>And now…at the worst possible moment, she had found out that Gura felt the same.</p>
<p>Said shark was now blushing even through the tears that stained her cheeks, her eyes now looking somewhere else and sniffling.</p>
<p>And for a moment, Amelia forgot about all that had happened and that was about to happen, not caring anymore…</p>
<p> </p>
<p>…And her lips ended onto Gura's ones.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. The future awaits</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>After the kiss the girls have to figure out how to get out of this situation, but with a gun pointed at them it seems like it won't be easy.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It was like Gura had zoned out. </p>
<p>The loneliness, the meeting with the detective, becoming her partner, the investigation, the worries, the infiltration and getting caught...all of that was put aside and forgotten even if just for a moment when the shark felt a warm pair of lips against hers. </p>
<p>She had never recieved (nor given) a kiss, the new sensation felt odd in some way but at the same time she wished it would never end. </p>
<p>Blushing profusely she reciprocated the gesture (even if she lacked the experience) and leaned even closer while closing her eyes like Amelia had done, the tears beginning to dry on her cheek, a warmth never felt before began spreading inside of her; the detective was putting all of her emotions for the shorter girl into the kiss that seemed to last a lifetime. <br/>Unfortunately they both needed to breathe again and, too soon to their liking, they detached their lips from each other. </p>
<p>Watson took in a shaky breath, this was new for her too. She opened her eyes and looked at the shark girl in front of her who was panting lightly; when her eyes met Gura's the girl glanced elsewhere in embarrassment, causing the blonde to smile. </p>
<p>If she had her hands free she would've caressed the girl's cheek but since they were stuck in that position she resorted to gently leaning her forehead onto Gura's and rubbing it in a gesture of affection. <br/>The shark, even though she was blushing, was happy like never before and did the same. </p>
<p>After a minute spent in silence Gura was the first one to speak up "We will find a way to save ourselves..." Amelia wasn't as hopeful as the shark but nodded at that statement. <br/>She wouldn't go down without a fight. </p>
<p>Suddenly, the door opened and the girls rapidly turned their glances towards it: Moria was standing there, gun in his hand and a wicked smile plastered onto his face. </p>
<p>"Get up" they could only comply. <br/>"You" he gestured to Amelia "Stay in front of me...and you..." This time he grabbed Gura's arm forcefully causing a yelp to escape her lips "You stay beside me".<br/>Watson wanted to punch the guy into a pulp but she couldn't do anything with a gun pointed towards the back of her head. </p>
<p>------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>He made them walk through a long corridor that headed upwards, it took them a while but in the end they had reached a metal door  that was currently slightly ajar. <br/>As they made their way outside, the detective saw that they ended up on the beach near where the company was built "Keep going detective, towards the dock..." Moria touched the back of her head with the gun's barrel and Watson kept on walking. </p>
<p>The sky was slowly beginning to change colors, signaling the start of a new day...they  now stood on the dock, and the detective suddenly felt a cold shiver ran down her spine. </p>
<p>'Why does this feel so familiar?'</p>
<p>The wind began picking up: it seemed like a storm was brewing up, the waves growing bigger...and as she looked towards the ocean she saw something in the water even if it wasn't clear. A shadowy figure in the ocean as big as a whale, moving closer to where they currently stood. </p>
<p>The detective felt the barrel of the gun again on the back, but she could only stare forward at the thing still hiding in the waves. <br/>Her eyes widened in horror as tentacles began emerging from the water. </p>
<p>'This...this is like the nightmare I keep on having...!' She realized, fear rising in her chest. </p>
<p>Gura began panicking and she hurriedly tried to think of a solution to save the blonde...and suddenly she remembered something she had kept hidden since she had met with Amelia. </p>
<p>"Goodbye detective" she heard the click of the safety being lifted from the pistol. </p>
<p>"AME!"</p>
<p>As he heard the shark call out her partner, he felt something wrap around his leg and looked down to see a tail wrapped around it. Gura pulled his foot and he missed the shot, ending up laying on his back onto the dock. </p>
<p>The gun slipped past his fingers and almost dropped into the ocean while the pocket-watch that belonged to the detective landed on the sand. <br/>Amelia immediately turned around and saw what was happening: the shark had jumped on top of the man and was currently biting his arm with ferocity, her pointed teeth drawing blood as he tried to pry her off. </p>
<p>Watson tried again to free herself from the handcuffs, pulling with all of her force and, after a few seconds of struggle, she managed to break them...and her right wrist. <br/>She bit her lip from the pain but she ignored it, adrenaline setting in: she had to help the shark. <br/>Moria managed to push the girl away making her fall on her side, holding the arm that was bleeding from the deep bite; it looked like she had tried to tear away a piece of his arm. </p>
<p>The detective located the pistol, not far from where the man ended and rushed to get it but Moria saw what was happening and did the same. The two ended up fighting over the gun as Amelia desperately tried to pry it away from his hands with only one arm. </p>
<p>Gura managed to get back on her feet and ran towards the two, tackling the man thanks to the fact they were 2 against 1; the detective finally managed to grab the gun and shot the man in the leg, causing him to scream in pain. </p>
<p>He began crawling towards the end of the dock while Watson stood in front of the shark on the opposite direction, gun still pointed towards him. <br/>"It's time to put an end to this case, you better comply." She spoke regaining her breath as the pain in her hand began setting in. </p>
<p>The man ended laying on the ground, breath ragged and cursing from the pain "AME! LOOK AT THE OCEAN!" As the shark spoke, Watson noticed one of the tentacles was headed towards their direction and yelled "RUN BACK TO THE BEACH!".</p>
<p>The two didn't waste time and ran away from the thing inching closer; turning around they saw the tentacle grab the man on the dock, who let out a scream of terror before getting dragged underwater. </p>
<p>The ocean then began calming down, the waves going back to the usual slow motion and the wind turned into a gentle breeze. <br/>The sun appeared at the horizon and the tentacles disappeared...everything was quiet. </p>
<p>Watson dropped the gun onto the sand and hurried towards Gura's side "Are you okay? You didn't get hurt right?" She sounded agitated as she searched for possible wounds on the shorter girl "I-I am fine! You on the other hand are not!" She replied staring at the broken wrist. <br/>Now running out of adrenaline Amelia felt a lot of pain, but she didn't mind too much because now they were safe. </p>
<p>She remembered seeing her pocket-watch end up in the sand and calmly walked over it, cleaning it from all the dirt: luckily it was still intact. </p>
<p>Gura walked to her and the two stared at each other for a second "Now...what do we do?" Came the shark's question. </p>
<p>Watson put away the clock and simply stated "We call the cops".</p>
<p>----------------------------------------------------</p>
<p>Amelia was currently being treated by paramedics with Gura (who had her handcuffs removed) right next to her, a huge number of cop cars surrounded the company building; officers were walking in and out of the place, taking away objects that would be later used as evidence. </p>
<p>"...And that's how we ended up here." Finished narrating the detective to the cop in front of her, letting out a pained 'Ow' as the medic bandaged her wrist. "I see...thank you for your work, this was something unexpected..." Commented the man, writing all of the information he just heard. <br/>He saluted the girls and then walked away to take care of things. </p>
<p>After she got treatment, Watson noticed Gura looking at her with a timid smile that seemed to say 'I'm glad you're safe' to which the blonde replied with a bright one. </p>
<p>"I guess it's time to head home. " She murmured, patting the shark's head with her good hand. </p>
<p>The case was solved. <br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>.</p>
<p>*A month later*</p>
<p>The news about the horrors going on at the Ancient Ones company had been revealed and left many people in shock. <br/>The building was closed off and the employees re-hired in other companies; the detective never revealed the existence of the creature that had appeared in the ocean...she wondered if it died as Moria had revealed to them since there was no vessel. </p>
<p>Amelia sighed, it was another normal day with no new case...but she didn't seem to mind this time, as that meant she could spend more time cuddling with the shark currently laying on her chest. <br/>Things had gone back to normal quite fast but it was for the better. </p>
<p>Watson wondered about the nightmare she always had and pondered if time traveling had an effect on her mind and made her see a future event, but now it didn't really matter as she stopped having nightmares. </p>
<p>"Ameee..." <br/>"Mh?"<br/>"Nothing, I just wanted to mess with you"<br/>"Oh you little...!" The detective flipped the shark under her and began tickling her, causing the shark into a fit of giggles. </p>
<p>"HAHAHA PLEASE IM SORRY!" She yelled through the laughter and finally Watson stopped teasing her, laughing at the silly situation. </p>
<p>She looked lovingly at the shark under her, brushing her nose onto her now girlfriend. </p>
<p>"I love you." She spoke softly, kissing the shark with the up most care, which was soon reciprocated. </p>
<p>The moment was suddenly interrupted by a phone call and Amelia with a frustrated sigh got up and answered. </p>
<p>"Detective Watson speaking...yes...Ok, we'll be there as soon as possible".<br/>The girls prepared and headed outside: Amelia finally had bought a car and the two entered, the blonde taking the wheel. </p>
<p>"Ready to go, detective Gura?"<br/>"Ready as usual, detective Watson!"</p>
<p>A detective's job is never over.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hope you enjoyed! It was fun writing this story, now it's time for more stories, next up a takamori fic! Follow me (if you want) on Twitter: @13MON4</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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